They Always Do
by infallibleflower
Summary: Deeks needs to know it wasn't his fault. So here it is. Densi post 5x19 Spoils of War
1. Chapter 1

**Deeks needed to know – so here it is. Post 5x19 Spoils of War.**

She hasn't said anything since she pretty much broke in his arms earlier. At dinner in the mess she ate with well less than half the usual Kensi Blye intensity he'd grown accustomed to. And he let it go because technically he'd done the same to her almost a year earlier. He regrets setting that precedent because he'd be the world's biggest hypocrite if he forced her to talk now, but he wants to. He wants to see her smile, wants to hear her crazy cackle-snort. And he's not sure he ever will again.

He's sure she'd see the guilt he has pooling in his eyes if she even bothered to look at him. But she's continually staring off into space and he's worried himself almost into a stupor that she's still focused on Jack; that she hasn't even noticed he's here.

But that guilt is there, eating away at him.

Guilt for not taking the shot. Guilt for going in the ambulance and leaving her with a promise of 'talking later'. Guilt for getting her sent off to Afghanistan and running into her fiancé in the middle of a war zone all because he couldn't curb his feelings for her. His almost unfounded _need_ to protect her.

He kind of wishes she'd sought him out on the plane. But she stayed in the back mumbling with Sam. He longs to be her source of comfort but by the time they land and pile into the SUV that will take them back to OSP all she's given him is a quick glance before hurriedly averting her eyes.

She's definitely avoiding him.

Hetty, Nell and Eric are waiting at the entrance to the bullpen for them. Nell is almost bursting at the seams and can't control herself from almost tackling Kensi with happiness while Eric stands in the background with tears in his eyes waiting for his turn. What he sees in Hetty shocks him though.

Hetty is looking straight at him, sadness and guilt sewn into her face.

He mumbles something about returning his gun to the armory when it's clear that Kensi still has no intention of acknowledging him. He swears it's not so nobody sees him shed a few tears of his own. He doesn't even realise their Operations Manager is following him until he turns at the bench. But unlike usual, she doesn't get a reaction out of him.

"What do you want Hetty?" he mumbles, dumping the rifle case rather haphazardly on the bench before pulling the now well-worn 'Touching Wood' t-shirt from underneath it.

"To congratulate you on a successful mission Detective," she replies softly.

Deeks only scoffs as he starts polishing the first section of his weapon. "Wasn't really me was it?"

"On the contrary Mr Deeks, your part in this rescue mission was invaluable. Without your efforts the ending may not have been quite so joyful."

"Just makes it even I guess," he concedes.

"Makes what even?" Hetty questions curiously.

"Well it's only fitting that I do something considering it was me that got her sent over there in the first place," Deeks grumbles.

"Mr Deeks you did nothing of the sort, what would give you that opinion?"

"I don't know Hetty, that you sent her there the _day_ after… after whatever happened. After I risked the mission and _national security_ because I didn't have the balls to say what I meant?"

"Marty," she begins softly. "You had _nothing_ to do with your partner getting reassigned. This mission was hers from the beginning."

"What the hell is that supposed to mean?" A voice starts from the entrance to the armory. Kensi storms in with anger written on her face.

"Ms Blye –" Hetty tries.

"No, don't you 'Ms Blye' me Hetty. What the hell do you mean it was _my_ mission?" Kensi starts angrily. "Did you know the whole time?"

"Jack Simon was my friend. I knew you knew him and I knew that when faced with the decision you would save his life."

"Wait… So it wasn't my fault?" Deeks interrupts hopefully, looking straight at Hetty as she turns again to look at him.

"No Mr Deeks, the blame for everything that has happened since before your partner was reassigned was entirely mine. Frankly I'm upset that you would think that it had anything to do with your feelings for Ms Blye."

"You're upset?" Kensi and Deeks both growl at the same time. They look toward each other and Kensi finally recognises the guilt in her partner's eyes.

"Hetty you sent her over there into a hellish situation you don't get to be upset," Deeks scolds.

"Yes Detective, and you can reprimand me further on Monday when you return to work. For now I think I owe you two some time to _talk_," Hetty offers before leaving the room silently.

"She's in for a rude awakening if she thinks we're letting her off the hook that easy," Kensi jokes weakly, taking a few steps closer and leaning on the side of the bench.

"I see your sense of humour has improved slightly in absence of my coaching," he fires back. "But I don't know how you're laughing right now."

"I figured it might stop me crying for once," she offers shyly.

"Hey, I'm just glad you're speaking to me."

"Well you were avoiding me."

"_Kens_, you wouldn't even look at me," he urges.

"Well I was scared," she mumbles.

"Scared of what Kensi, what possible reason could you have for being scared to _look_ at me? Because I can tell you while you've been hiding inside your head and in the back of airplanes I've run _every_ scenario through my head. I've been letting you deal with it however you want, scared to push and find out that we're not at that place anymore."

"Deeks –"

"No let me finish, please. You got sent away Kensi, and for _four months_ I was convinced it was my fault. That because I didn't know how to control my feelings and pull the trigger when required you were off on the other side of the world. Those conversations were my lifeline Kensi, and I don't know if they meant as much to you as they did to me –"

"They did. I swear to God they did, Deeks."

"Good," he chokes out. "Because then you might be able to figure out how I felt when you missed our check in last week. And then when I found out that you'd gone off into the dessert to look for your _fiancé_ without backup," he finishes, looking at her hopefully.

"Wait, did you think that's what it'd come down to?" Kensi begins as she takes a step around the bench so they're face to face. "That it'd be you or him?" His eye-averting gaze is all she needs to confirm her suspicions.

"Deeks, that's stupid."

"Not really," he mumbles to his feet. "I mean, you guys must have had it good yeah? Communication and all that."

"He never stood a chance. And I don't want to butcher this, but the place I went to in my head to stop the pain? It was _you_ Deeks," she breathes.

"My smile?" he grins.

"Your smile, your laugh, everything. It was the _only_ thing that got me through it. Not Jack or thinking about the past, just you and _our_ future."

"_Our_ future. I like that," he smiles as he reaches out to grab her hands.

"So does this mean we're communicating now?" she teases, bumping her hip against him.

"I mean, sure I guess," he jokes. "But I always preferred our _usual_ form of communicating."

"That's funny, I was about to say the same thing," she laughs, reaching up to throw her arms around his neck and plant her lips on his.

They had a long way to go and he was sure she wouldn't be this happy waking up from nightmares four times a night but they'd figure it out.

_They always do_.


	2. Chapter 2

Kensi and Deeks left the Mission after a debriefing that didn't go into much – if any – detail at all. Walking to the carpark in silence, Kensi let herself smile when she noticed her SRX in Deeks' parking space.

"You've been driving my car?" she asks softly.

"Uh, yeah. My car isn't exactly a _work_ car and I just wanted to –" he cut off, letting a breath out heavily and running his hand over the back of his neck. "It's going to sound dumb but I wanted… I _needed_ a piece of you. I could still hear you scolding me for driving it wrong. It helped. A little."

"That's fair. I took all the shirts that were in your locker in the gym," she admits.

"Oh, I know. I got mocked by the guys because I told them I didn't want to work out that day," he laughed, opening the passenger side door of the car as the got closer.

"I think you can drive it one more time, I'm not exactly… y'know."

"Yeah, sure," he mumbles softly, his mind drifting once again to the image of her beaten body stumbling across the valley.

"Just take me home, Shaggy."

"You got it Fern," he says softly and she feels fuzzy at the name it feels she hasn't heard in lifetimes.

The car ride to Kensi's place is spent entirely in silence – Kensi stares out the window and Deeks stares at her at every stop sign, red light and clear point in traffic. She can feel his looks, can feel the warmth and safety they bring. And she hopes she doesn't ruin it, this fascination he has with looking at her.

She finally gathers the courage to swing open the door, although what she's afraid of she isn't sure. She's almost completely certain that there's no members of the Taliban lurking inside her house, completely certain that Deeks wouldn't leave her alone like she'd done to him.

She hadn't tried hard enough with Jack nine years ago and she hadn't tried hard enough with Deeks. Now was her chance.

"Are you coming in?" she asks sincerely, turning as she notices he's still sitting in the car.

"I wasn't sure if you wanted me to."

"Yes," she shoots quickly. "I want you to come in. To be honest, I'm pretty sure I need you to come in."

She feels slightly giddy at his obvious sigh of relief, and they walk side by side up to her front door. She notices that her mail has clearly been taken in and the house actually looks looked-after for the first time in recent history. She wonders what kind of magic house-keeping fairy Hetty has on payroll that would look after her house.

And then Deeks pulls out what is obviously a key to her apartment and unlocks and opens the door and it's blindingly obvious what has occurred.

Her place is _clean_. By her standards anyway. Not only is it clean though, but there's a dog bed in the corner of her living room and a pair of her partner's shoes by the front door, along with a surfboard and the sound of claws hitting hard floors getting louder and louder.

"Monty!" she chirps happily before dropping to her knees and accepting furry kisses.

"Yeah, sure Monty, greet _Kensi_ like that. Just ignore me," Deeks jokes half-heartedly.

"I think he just missed Mommy more. _Didn't you baby_?" she coos, and Deeks' eyebrows shoot well into his hairline at her openness.

"He's not the only one," Deeks mumbles.

"I hadn't noticed," she retorts dryly. "Did we agree you were moving in before I left?"

"Uh… not really. It just – it made me feel like I was helping, cleaning, TiVo-ing episodes of Top Model. And I'd know if you came back…" he trails off.

"Deeks, it means a lot. Really," she smiles.

"So, uh – now that you're home, I guess we..?" Deeks trails off questioningly.

"Now we talk."

"Really?" He asks, shocked. She nods. "We're going to talk?" Nod again. "About?"

"Our thing. Why I was avoiding you on the way home?"

"Yes. Please," he breathes. "Second first."

"Sam told me some stuff. And it made me feel guilty," she admits.

"Kens, there is absolutely _no_ reason for you to feel guilty about _anything_ that happened over there."

"There is for what I made you do."

"And what did I do?" he questions, afraid her line of questioning is going exactly where he _doesn't _want it to go. And in that moment he's the Deeks of almost a year earlier. Dodging questions and avoiding her. He doesn't want her to know what he did. _Who he became_.

"Sam said Sergeant McCarr told him what happened in that house. With the man you swapped me for."

"Did he now? And what exactly was he told?" His voice is cracking, and if it's obvious to him it's going to be obvious to the one person on the planet that knows him best.

"Deeks…" she trails off.

"Please Kensi, don't hate me. I swear I didn't really do anything, I didn't _want_ to do anything. But I _had_ to. Kensi they had you and I didn't know what they were doing, and you don't have to tell me what happened in that cave, Lord knows I'm not really up for sharing torture stories. But I _had_ to do it."

By the end he's visibly breaking. All the emotion from the last few days, and the loneliness from the last few months is seeping out and he's losing it. He basically flops down on the nearby couch and throws his head over the back with his hands over his eyes.

"Deeks, I could never hate you. _Never_," she swears, sinking down as close as possible to him. She may as well be sitting on his lap.

"But you don't know what I did Kens," he groans.

"I know, but –"

"No, I waterboarded him Kensi. I tied up an old, blind man and held a rag over his face while I tipped a bucket of water over him. I _tortured_ someone Kensi."

"You saved me Deeks. You didn't even get through one bucket. You saved me and you didn't let it change who you were," she prods, holding firmly to his hands that she's pulled from his face.

"But it _has_. I'm not that guy who promised to be patient and you're not the girl who asked him to. We've both changed Kensi."

"Yes we're different people now. We've both done things that have changed us: you did whatever was necessary to get me back and I tried to shoot Sabatino," she says in an attempt to lighten the darkening mood.

"Good," he scoffs.

"The point is, _together_ we can still be the same. I want to be the same, anyway."

"Me too, Kens. God, me too," he breathes, rolling onto his side on the couch and pulling her down with him so she's settled between the back of the couch and his body.

"Then we're going to work hard at this. We're going to show Hetty she made a mistake in doing this to us, and we're going to show Granger that I'm not actually as co-dependent on my partner as I made it seem while I was over there. And we _have_ to prove to Callen and Sam that we can _do_ this."

"Done. Whatever it takes, right?" he agrees, kissing her forehead.

"Whatever it takes."


End file.
